


The Buried Archaeologist

by magicianparrish



Series: Halloween PJO Challenge [8]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: pjo halloween
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-29 01:28:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5111318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magicianparrish/pseuds/magicianparrish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Annabeth goes on an excursion and becomes a buried archaeologist.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Buried Archaeologist

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Halloween Eve! Today is day eight, and we have Annabeth up!
> 
> This was written well over a year ago, and was the original inspiration for this whole thing. I hope you like it! 
> 
> Context: 1903, Valley of Kings, Egypt 
> 
> Terms: 
> 
> Valley of Kings- a valley in Egypt where, for a period of nearly 500 years from the 16th to 11th century BC, tombs were constructed for the Pharaohs and powerful nobles of the New Kingdom 
> 
> Howard Carter- the famous archaeologist who discovered King Tut’s tomb in 1922

**1903, Valley of Kings, Egypt**

Annabeth loved her job. As an archaeologist she was able to travel all over the world and recover artifacts that past human civilizations have left for humanity today. It was just the turn of the century and women were starting to gain the rights they finally deserved. Well, not really considering it was only 1903. But she was lucky enough to attend Harvard University and get a job right out of college. Annabeth was not a regular woman. A woman at her age, which is twenty two should already be married and bearing children. She was never a fan of having children anyway.

She and her crew were located in the deserts of Egypt trying to locate old tombs of the ancient pharaohs. So far they’ve gotten nothing but a lot of sand everywhere. It was kind of frustrating but they had all signed up for this archaeological adventure. Annabeth Chase was always up for a challenge, and she knew that finding new tombs of Ancient Egypt could be dangerous.

The entire crew had locals help them guide across the deserts of Egypt with the camels they had. Only the people who helped carry the expensive new device called cameras walked on the sand. It would be too bumpy to have that equipment on the back of a camel. Cameras were not easy to come by that was for sure.

As they trekked, the sun was beating down hard on top of Annabeth’s skin making it burn a red color. She sighed and put her curly blonde hair up in a nice bun to keep it from sticking to the back of her neck. The light blouse she was wearing did not help her feel less hot. The black trousers and leather boots she had on were burning her a little bit and she regretted that choice in clothes just a little bit.

“Feeling a little sweaty there Chase?” One of her fellow crew mates asked her.

Being the only woman on the crew, she was often ostracized for being there. Women were still considered inferior and she tried not to let the men get to her. She huffed and grabbed the reins on the camel again.

“Just as much as you are,” she retorted back.

The man shut up after that. Annabeth prided herself on her quick thinking and wit. It wasn’t often that women had that talent and showed it off. But Annabeth let nothing back. She made it this far in a male-dominated world, she could only keep going forward from here.

In the distance Annabeth saw some blue contrasting with the light yellow tint of sand that surrounded her. She squinted her eyes just to make sure she was seeing correctly.

“Is that the Nile over there?” she asked.

Annabeth saw all the men squinting their eyes to see the little strip of blue and green over the horizon. It was easy to miss but if you concentrated enough you could see it.

“I think it is m’dear,” the leader of the crew, Howard Carter said.

He was from England so Annabeth sometimes had a hard time trying to figure out what he was saying at times. England has so many different accents it was hard to decipher some words that were coming out of their mouths. She was from Virginia herself, and she knew that there was a southern twang in her accent at times. They all learned to deal with each other though.

As the camels kept going, the blue strip of the Nile got larger in the distance. But something else also caught Annabeth’s eye. There were edges of rocks that jutted out and something down below the high rocks. It looked like a valley of some sorts. The sight intrigued Annabeth and she willed her camel to move just a little bit faster. The men followed in her lead wanting to know what sparked her curiosity.

When the finally stopped in front of the valley there was complete silence. There wasn’t even any wind blowing the sands in their eyes and mouth. It was a dead silence. She looked over to see the faces of all her fellow comrades. Their eyes were wide and mouths were hanging open in shock. She was willing to bet she looked the same way.

Howard took a deep breath in. “This is the Valley of Kings,” he declared with awe.

They’ve all heard of this famous landmark. Hearing about it is one thing, but seeing it with your own eyes is a completely other experience all together.

“Well, what are we waiting for lads? Let’s go!” Howard said leading the way on his camel.

Annabeth followed in after him taking in all the rising dunes and rock pillars that shot up like those skyscrapers that were being built in New York City. When they reached a clearing, the crew all jumped off their camels and got their gear ready for exploring. There had to be so many tombs just waiting to be discovered, Annabeth thought.

They all split up and started to cover every mile of ground they could. Annabeth traveled close to the edges hoping to find a door that lead to an underground tomb. She kept her left hand touching the rock and slowly sliding her tan fingers across the rock. While she was doing that, she was observing every inch of the magnificent place surrounding her. How many times in her life will she be able to say that she went to the Valley of Kings? Not much, that much she could say.

Finally, she felt a crevice in the rock formation and she gasped with excitement. She kept her left hand on the wall while she took out a chisel and duster to get away at the hardened rock sediment and dust it away hoping to reveal a door. When she completed doing that, there was in fact a door. It was very old and rotted away so she was able to lift it up and out with ease. Inside it was dark and she couldn’t see anything.

Out of her backpack she took out a flashlight and turned it on. “I found something!” She screamed while looking into the unknown abyss. She will admit, that she was feeling a little scared going into the unknown. But what’s life without a little risk? That was always her motto and she would steal her nerves and continue living with that motto. She heard her fellow crew members running towards her with excitement.

When the found her they were all trying to catch their breaths. Some were bent over heaving in and out. It was a few minutes before they were back to normal.

“What’d you find Chase?”

“It’s a door to a tomb I think. It’s too dark to see anything for more than five feet. But I’m going in to explore,” She explained.

One of the nicer men stepped forward. He looked scared for her and hesitant.

“Annabeth, I don’t think you should do that. It could be really dangerous.”

She just sighed and looked at the man. She’d always liked him because he treated her as an equal.

“Michael, you and I both know that signing up for this job is dangerous. But I found something, and I need to go exploring into it so I can find out what it is and figure out more about how the Egyptians lived. It’s part of the job description.”

Michaels brown eyes were looking towards the sand and he looked sad that he might lose a comrade. Annabeth put a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

“What’s life without a little risk?” She asked.

Annabeth and Michael looked each other in the eyes for a second and she gave him a small smile. Then she looked at the rest of her crew dead in the eyes.

“I’m going in whether you like it or not.”

There was silence for a few seconds. Then the man who she didn’t like, Patrick said, “Good luck in there Chase.”

She just nodded at him in response. Annabeth flicked on the flashlight and started to descend into the unknown. The flashlight provided little light after the opening eventually became so minuscule that it provided no natural light from the outside world. The walls were covered with these intricate and colorful hieroglyphics that depicted all these different stories. This reminded her of the ancient Greek myths. She felt like she was Theseus inside the labyrinth looking for the Minotaur to kill. Except she didn’t have Ariadne’s string to guide her through. She was on her own.

There were many different doors that opened up to new paths inside. She was amazed that the Egyptians were able to create such elaborate tomb structures underground. It could be highly unstable she thought. Even though that thought was a little unnerving, she kept going through with her advances.

Every time she entered a chamber, she thought she had found the actual tomb of the pharaoh mummy. Instead she find loads and loads of these gold and gems which was enough riches to make the United States rich for decades to come. Cat statues were painted black and gold were everywhere protecting the mummy who was laid to rest somewhere in the tomb. Every time she entered one of these, it was just an antechamber. More hieroglyphics were seen presenting new stories of Ancient Egyptian history that she wouldn’t be able to figure out because she didn’t know how to read them properly. She knew some symbols, but that was about it. Annabeth’s forte was in ancient greek, she could decipher that stuff easily as adding and subtracting.

She didn’t know how long she had been inside the tomb walls, but she realized that she’d been in there for probably a while. Even though she didn’t find the actual tomb of the mummy she wanted, she had a nice memory on how she got there. So she could just continue tomorrow.

Annabeth started to make her way back again. Finding her way out was a little difficult though. Occasionally she’d hear scarabs and snakes slithering past her feet and she’d let out a little scream in fear. Nothing actually bit her though which she was thankful for. She could feel the air pressure becoming a little lighter as she made her way back up.

She was about five hundred feet from the entrance when she felt it. There was a little rumbling underneath her feet and sand started to fall down from the ceiling cracks. She looked up and covered her eyes from the sand trying to figure out what was happening. Suddenly, the ground started to shake more violently; so much so that she was barely able to run her way out. Cracks started to appear more in the ceiling and walls making Annabeth more nervous. She could hear the faint voices of her comrades.

“Are you okay down there Chase?”

“Are you screaming? Do you need help?!”

“What’s happening down there?”

The ceiling finally cracked and a large piece of it fell onto her head making a giant cut form on her head and covering her blonde hair with crimson blood. She let out a painful wail. Sand poured on top of her quickly making her panic even more.

“Annabeth? Annabeth!” Michael screamed.

More pieces of the ceiling fell on either around her or on top of her making Annabeth crumple to the ground in pain. Blood was spilling everywhere staining her white shirt and the light yellow sand that was quickly engulfing her body.

“Help me!” She screamed.

Annabeth almost wanted to think it was a curse that the ancient pharaoh had set on his tomb. Trespassers would be punished if they entered their tomb. And Annabeth was that trespasser. She wasn’t really into supernatural things like that, but it seemed like an almost logical reason in her state of panic.

As the final trick, a horde of spiders came crawling out of the walls surrounding her in a black tornado. Spiders had always been her worst fear and this was like living a real life nightmare. They crawled up her body and surrounded her like a cocoon making her scream even more than before. Soon sand was up to her face and she was struggling to breathe. In her final moments of life, she had accepted her fate.

She had followed her motto of taking risks and look at where that got her. Annabeth Chase was now a buried archaeologist.

**Author's Note:**

> Jason is on deck for the final installment of this series!


End file.
